This page captures my most recent work in response to the pandemic, racial disparity in healthcare and collective pain.
Me/You/Us and the question - hand embroidery on hand dyed silk organza, 48” x 48” x 48”
Can I ask a question of a thread ? - 2min 56 sec.
The video was filmed with a medical camera used to examine and document the retina in an ophthalmologist’s office. The shallow depth of field enhances a sense of interiority and investigation.
Feeble Barriers - 101 hand embroidered and machine sewn masks made with cotton organdy with exaggerated ties.
Fragility and Feebleness has become second nature to us these days. But some experience this more acutely than others. Viewing the COVID 19 virus as the “great equalizer” has quickly been revealed as a farcical idea. The masks we wear have been ripped and the ugliness within has been revealed. Our healthcare workers, first responders and essential workers continue their jobs with danger lurking at every turn. They face each day not knowing if they will continue to be the same that night. They bear witness to horrific situations of life and death, suffering and survival in their raw “unmasked” state. The mask has become a symbol for many conflicting ideas today- protection and consideration for others but also fear and partisanship. This thin piece of fabric has become a fault line where political identities are determined when it should simply be what it is- a feeble barrier against a pandemic. Many stories are being written on it- some about last breaths, some about courage and valor, some about love, some about inequality, some about survival, some about the ripple effects of COVID 19. Feeble Barriers is a record of our times as seen through the eyes of health care workers as we battle a mysterious monster in the dark. If you are a healthcare worker and would like to contribute to this project with a quote, please email me. I plan to expand this collection to a 101 masks.
This work was on view at Grove Gallery, Milwaukee in July 2020.
Cello composition by Janet Schiff (Lullaby for Rest) 75 hand embroidered and machine stitched masks made with cotton organdy
Pandemic Impulses is a crown sourced community participation video series
I am fascinated by the way human beings are dealing with what is monumentally out of our control. Each of us have our own logic in making sense of it all...
How are you keeping track of the pandemic? Are days and weeks blending together? Do you have a particular gesture, ritual or daily act that is a non- traditional way of documenting the passage of time? As a post modern art movement, Absurdism attempts to formulate a method of rationalizing irrational aspects in an uncertain world. The current moment seems fertile ground for absurdist art. Please share your particular ways of coping. Nothing is too absurd or silly. If it makes sense to you, that's all that matters. In fact, absurdity contains the very seeds of creativity.
Please participate!
